Sunday, February 3, 2008

Rawnsley on the US Presidential race

Andrew Rawnsley has an excellent article in the Observer on the US election, entitled "America's Moment of Truth".

He talks a lot about the possibility of the US having its first woman President or its first "Black" (Mixed race) President. But I think underplays the possibility of the US having its first Oven Chip as President.

He raises a sobering thought:

For the past 20 years, it's been true that anyone can be President so long as they are called Bush or Clinton. If Hillary spends two terms in the White House, family dynasties will have commanded the Great Republic for more than a quarter of a century. At an Obama event in New York, I saw a placard with a potent slogan. It simply said: 'The White House is not a time share.'

I am get a little bemused by all these references to Barack Obama being possibly "Amercia's first Black President". As Rawnsley says:

As he wrote in The Audacity of Hope, he has 'relatives who resemble Margaret Thatcher and others who could pass for Bernie Mac'. It is more accurate to say of Obama that he would be the first mixed race President of the United States.

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